Name: Matt Smith
Name of Your Business: Early To Rise
What Your Business Does: Publishing
URL: www.EarlyToRise.com
1. What’s your biggest business accomplishment and what did you learn from it?
My biggest business accomplishment has been developing relationships with a wide ranging network of influential, interesting and impressive people.
This has lead to numerous financial opportunities for me, but that’s not the half of it. Surrounding yourself with truly impressive people enriches your life on all levels.
The biggest thing I learned from the experience is actually HOW to do it. Just five years ago I was making a lot of money, but was essentially living in a very unsatisfying vacuum. One day I simply decided I was going to stop chasing money and only do things that interested me.
Interesting people interest me. So, that’s where I started.
Building a network like this demands that I demonstrate, in every encounter and consistently over time, that I am both a person who adds value and a person who can be fully trusted.
I actually detailed this process in a report called the Network Infiltration Report. You can download it free here.
2. Favorite Book EVER and Why:
For me, books are all about timing. Some things seem to ring especially true at certain points in your life. In my case, one of the most influential books I’ve ever read (and I’ve read it no less then a dozen times by now) is “Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life”
I don’t expect that to be on anyone else’s top ten list, but for me it was, and continues to be, hugely influential. Epictetus along with a few others have provided the perspective by which I view MY life and what I need to do with it.
The Stoics aren’t very popular these days but in the last couple of years they’ve gained some fame when Tim Ferriss started talking about another great Stoic, Seneca. http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/04/13/stoicism-101-a-practical-guide-for-entrepreneurs/
3. What’s one thing people online don’t know about you that you’d like to share?
Frankly, I’ve been doing business online since 1998 and most people in this community probably have no idea who I am and if they’ve heard of me they know little to nothing about me.
I think I prefer it that way.
4. What’s one mistake that you see business builders making online and what should they do instead?
The internet is training us to be fast, short term thinkers and has made success too easy. Too easy? Yes, and I think that ‘ease of success’ has created a trap for business builders.
Very few internet marketers, in particular, seem to understand the basic value equation that’s driven the success of businesses pre-easy button days.
Just like building a great network, businesses are built on constantly adding value to your customer’s lives and demonstrating that you are trustworthy. Too many marketers are hide behind good intentions while spending 90% of their time trying to separate people from their money.
Nothing wrong with making sales. That’s why we’re in business.
But, our businesses are dominated by the guiding principle that we’ll provide more value, each and every day to our customers then we ever ask for in return.
Beyond that more people need to take to heart the ideas discussed in Seth Godin’s short book, Tribes, and rehashed in numerous other places. The world needs leaders. It needs people to stand up and stand for something.
5. If you started over building your business today, what’s the ONE thing you’d do differently?
I’ve created eight companies in the last several years so I’ve had the opportunity to refine my approach with each. The biggest thing I’m focusing on now is trying to make sure that I’m working on things where I can best put my strengths to work and avoiding everything else.
As Entrepreneurs, we tend to naturally fill voids. If there is a problem, we jump in to fix it. If we didn’t do that, we wouldn’t be successful. But, as our businesses reach a certain level you just can’t do that. You have to focus on your “stupid human trick” as a wise friend of mine likes to call it.
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